Hundreds of residents who faced evictions from their mobile homes on the shores of Lake Camanche got a break Tuesday afternoon.
The East Bay Municipal Utility District decided to allow the more than 200 residents, who are mostly senior citizens, to stay put for now.
In an update of its Mokelumne Watershed Master Plan, EBMUD had been considering an option that could eliminate the mobile home parks as a "general increase in protective measures related to water quality."
Many of the residents who live at Camanche's three mobile home parks took a road trip to Oakland on Tuesday to let their landlord know they don't want to move.
"This will only get contentious, this will cost East Bay money," said Lake Camanche resident Ron Wood. "I think the negative publicity will certainly come out."
The district contends the mobile homes are no longer mobile and many are in poor condition.
"I hear these things got no axles, they got no wheels, and even worse when the prospect of connecting them to anything that would move them means they would fall apart at the seams," said EBMUD Director Frank Mellon. "It makes me seriously question just how safe these places really are."
But the mobile home parks generate $400,000 profit each year for the district and studies show they have had little impact on water quality at Camanche. Late Tuesday afternoon the board decided to allow the current residents to stay. The board also assured residents they could sell their mobile homes or pass them down to family members.
But in exchange for not evicting residents from the land, new rules will limit what improvements they can make.
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